Billy Joe and Nancy Sorrels met years ago when they were both working at J.L. Clark.

Long retired, they now hope the septic tank keeps working.

“This old house is in pretty bad shape,” said Joe, 79, during an interview last month at the couple’s home. “If anything happened to it we’d be up the river.”

Said Nancy, 78: “We’d have to move or something.”

Connecting to municipal sewer would cost thousands of dollars, money the Sorrels say they don’t have. They live on Social Security and a small pension that totals about $1,900 a month.

They are not officially poor, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s threshold of $13,878 for a household of two people 65 and older.

It just seems that way.

“By the time we pay our bills there’s nothing left,” said Billy Joe, who added that the couple struggles to make ends meet after food, medicine and living expenses.

They own their home, but pay $570 a month in mortgage and taxes. And everything seems to be getting more expensive, they said.

“While the poor and young can improve their financial situation by getting a job — or a better one — or take classes to retrain for the needs of the workplace, the elderly and poor are stuck,” says Alan Jones, marketing director for Lifescape Community Services in Rockford, the largest agency serving the needs of the elderly in northern Illinois.

“Their incomes are fixed.”

The Sorrelses are Lifescape clients. Their daughter pays for weekday meal service. She ordered meals after Nancy was hospitalized in November.

Lifescape driver John Silva’s daily arrival with a hot meal is announced by Hunter, a Yorkie, and Pig, a poodle. It’s one of 33 stops Silva makes and among 8,000 meals providing nutrition to seniors, many of them shut-ins.

“It’s a nice feeling knowing you’re important to somebody,” said Silva, 59, who retired last year from AT&T.

Many of his clients are shut-ins and he is sometimes their only visitor for the day. Others have medical problems. Nancy had three small strokes and has neuropathy in her feet. She has trouble walking and early stage dementia. Billy Joe has had medical challenges, too.

They aren’t shut-ins, but they don’t do much outside the house. Their routine is determined by their needs.

“That’s all we do, go to the doctor and to the grocery store,” Billy Joe said.

He’s not complaining, though: “A lot of people aren’t getting by as good as we are.”

Although the Sorrelses realize they’re living on the edge, they haven’t lost their sense of humor.

“We’ve got everything paid for at the cemetery,” he said. “Our daughter paid for it. That’s why I keep looking in the paper to see if I’m in the obits.”